New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science
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The New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science is a natural history and science museum in Albuquerque, New Mexico near Old Town Albuquerque. The Museum was founded in 1986.
The Museum's permanent exhibit halls illustrate a "journey through time", covering the birth of the Earth (~13.6 billion years ago) to the Ice Age (~10,000 years ago). The seven exhibit halls are as follows: Origins, Age of Super Giants, New Mexico's Seacoast, Age of Volcanoes, Evolving Grasslands, Cave Experience, and New Mexico's Ice Age. "Age of Super Giants" features the complete skeletons of Seismosaurus, Saurophaganax, Stegosaurus, and one leg of a Brachiosaurus.
The statues of two dinosaurs, a Pentaceratops and a Albertosaurus, stand at the entrance. Many dinosaur fossils have been found in New Mexico, and a few of the ones on display in the museum are only known from New Mexico.
The Museum's newest permanent exhibition, "STARTUP: Albuquerque and the Personal Computer Revolution," is the first museum gallery dedicated to the history of the microcomputer and the technology innovations that revolutionized the modern world. A permanent gallery at the Museum, STARTUP will educate and inspire young and old alike with unique stories and hands-on exhibit elements. Based on a concept by Microsoft co-founder Paul G. Allen, and born of his desire to give back to the Albuquerque community where he and Bill Gates started Microsoft, STARTUP takes visitors through important technological and cultural developments that have transformed society.
The Museum is home to the LodeStar Astronomy Center, a planetarium. LodeStar has two floors of exhibit galleries that include a scale model of the solar system, as well as exhibits about galaxies, astronomy tools, and the search for life in the universe. The first-floor exhibit Cosmic Journey walks visitors through the scale and structure of the universe. The second-floor exhibits include Tools of the Astronomer, Are We Alone?, Making Tracks on Mars, and changing photography exhibits, including the annual astrophotography contest, “Astro-Images of New Mexico.” LodeStar is an independent University of New Mexico community outreach project that operates in partnership with the Museum and The New Mexico Museum of Natural History Foundation under a Joint Powers Agreement. The LodeStar Astronomy Center opened to the public in 2000.
The Museum also houses changing exhibits, a cafe, gift store (NatureWorks), and the Lockheed Martin DynaTheather (a giant screen theater similar to IMAX).
